Save Article

Standing Guard

Since Sept. 11, security chief John Liegel's
job is not only to make his clients safer, but also to make them feel
safer

By

Melissa Hankins

Updated March 11, 2002 12:01 a.m. ET

John Liegel sucks on a Marlboro Light as he hurries to 1 Hudson Square, a commercial building nestled next to the entrance to the Holland Tunnel in downtown Manhattan. It's an unseasonably warm day in January, four months since the World Trade Center attacks. He stops short on Hudson Street, and his eyes scan the perimeter of the building. He is worried about its safety.

It's not just Sept. 11 that has made him wary. Terrorism haunts Mr. Liegel.

In December 1975, he was directing traffic at LaGuardia Airport when a bomb exploded that killed 12 people and wounded 150 others. In February 1993, working as a police officer for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, Mr. Liegel arrived at his post at the World Trade Center just as a bomb went off, killing six people and injuring more than 1,000. In 1994, Mr. Liegel was patrolling the streets in lower Manhattan when a man firebombed a crowded subway car directly below him. Running down to the train station to help, he was seriously hurt -- his eyes were scratched raw by smoke and debris, and he suffered severe smoke poisoning.

On Sept. 11, he was in his office on Trinity Place, just blocks from the World Trade Center. As a director of security for U.S. Security Associates Inc., of Roswell, Ga., Mr. Liegel helped a preschool class of two- to five-year-olds at Trinity Church escape the nightmare downtown.

In the months since the towers fell, Mr. Liegel's job has landed him at the heart of both the spiritual and the commercial healing of New York. As the head of security for about a dozen commercial properties in SoHo and Tribeca, and for Trinity Church and St. Paul's Chapel downtown, Mr. Liegel is responsible for quelling the fears of thousands of Manhattanites worried about where they work and worship.

"After an incident like [Sept. 11], everyone thinks they're a target," he says. "My clients all want to know if I think a terrorist attack will happen to them."

Quieting Fears

Mr. Liegel left law enforcement several years ago and took a sales job for a while to try his hand at something different. But he returned to his roots in security at the beginning of last year.

Since the attacks, his job consists of making the rounds. He checks on guards at his various properties, popping in at different times and days to keep them on their toes (and signing the visitor's log in red pen so they know he was there). He meets with other security personnel to make plans for beefing up procedures. And, in perhaps the biggest change since Sept. 11, he spends a good deal of time with clients, answering their questions, giving them updates and generally reassuring them.

One thing has made his job a little easier since the attacks: All categories of crime have actually declined in New York since Sept. 11, Mr. Liegel says. So far, one of the worst culprits he has dealt with was a vandal who taunted him by smearing "come and get me" on the walls of one of the properties Mr. Liegel protects. Mr. Liegel got him, all right -- a suspect was arrested a few weeks ago.

This warm January morning, Mr. Liegel is on his way to a meeting with his two deputies in 1 Hudson Square. Standing outside the building, he recalls not Sept. 11, but 1993 -- a foiled terrorism plot against the neighboring tunnel -- with a shake of his head and a promise.

"We're going to bring this building up to a very high level of security," he says.

It looks pretty secure already. Police officers line the outside of the building, and a New York Police Department bomb-squad van sits on the corner. But Mr. Liegel says they're probably just stopping by to eat or to rest. The building houses Nino's, a diner that has closed its doors to the public and become a full-time refuge for Ground Zero workers.

On his way in, Mr. Liegel pauses by a memorial that has sprouted on Nino's sidewalk. He points to a prominently displayed picture of Kenneth Tietjen, a Port Authority police officer. "That was a friend of mine," he says.

Inside 1 Hudson, Mr. Liegel sets himself at a round table stacked high with blueprints, waiting for his two deputies to show up. The first, retired NYPD Detective Joe Redican, joins him in the cramped room a couple of floors below securities giant
Morgan Stanley
& Co., which relocated there after its offices in the Trade Center were destroyed. Both men are dressed conservatively in suits and ties, but they haven't lost their tough-cop wariness or streetwise demeanor.

Today's agenda is broad: tightening security in Mr. Liegel's entire portfolio, all of which -- the commercial buildings and the churches -- is owned by the Parish of Trinity Church. The two discuss installing digital cameras, screening pedestrian traffic and beefing up parking and loading-dock procedures. It's a big project that includes creating elaborate electronic photo ID cards for every employee of every tenant in every building they cover. Currently, each tenant issues its own ID cards; under the new system, the property owner would supply a universal card to its tenants, color-coded to indicate the employee's status (what company he or she works for, temporary or full time, and so on). The cards would be easier for guards to recognize and would track the employees as they move throughout the buildings.

The deputies just purchased a $13,000 machine to make those cards. "We want to account for every single person that comes into our buildings," Mr. Redican says.

Mr. Liegel wants to hire another deputy to monitor the database that the new ID system will require. "Joe, Allen and I have some computer skills, but they're not great," he says. He hasn't checked his e-mail since Sept. 11, when his own office in 74 Trinity Place was damaged by the attacks. Mr. Redican has been opening and printing any e-mails that Mr. Liegel needs.

Besides computer skills, Mr. Liegel and Mr. Redican would like the deputy to have a law-enforcement or military background. They both hold a thick stack of resumes in their laps, proof of what a hot market security has become.

Mr. Liegel says there are more opportunities in security since Sept. 11 than ever. Anyone who has any interest in security is busy, from commercial building guards to personal bodyguards. "I even know retired cops who started little businesses where they open up a company's mail," he says.

But Mr. Liegel expects the sector to become saturated and level off in the next few years -- if nothing further catastrophic happens, that is. Mr. Redican adds, as the two part ways to make their rounds, "The meetings have gotten longer, and the folders have gotten thicker."

Sacred Ground

Mr. Liegel wants to head downtown to check on his churches. But first he stops by 100 Sixth Avenue, where Trinity Church's offices -- and his own -- are temporarily housed until the damaged 74 Trinity is reopened. Mr. Liegel collects a few things from his tiny gray cubicle. It contains nothing more than a desk and a poster saluting the firefighters that died the day of the attacks. Sitting there, he takes a moment to switch gears -- and leave the corporate world behind for a while.

"Security is nuts and bolts on the corporate end, but working for the clergy means you have to be attuned to the spiritual side of things," Mr. Liegel says. "If a suspicious person is hanging out in the lobby of a commercial building, you just throw them out. But you can't do that in church, and you get more suspicious figures there. Anyone can come into a church, no matter who they are&hellip;the worst criminals."

All is well at Trinity Church. Mr. Liegel takes one of the two security guards on duty outside to talk -- he doesn't like to raise his voice above a whisper in church. The other guard, Kevin Mulligan, stays inside and offers his take on the security industry since Sept. 11. "We get a little more respect now," Mr. Mulligan says. "Before, we were the butt of everyone's jokes. Now they realize they need us."

Satisfied with the state of affairs at Trinity, Mr. Liegel leaves one holy edifice and heads toward another. "When my wife says, 'Let's go to church,' I tell her she's got to be kidding," he says. "I've already been to five services this week."

The sidewalk in front of St. Paul's Chapel, a few blocks north, is lined with photos, flowers and various well-wishes that have been left there in the months since Sept. 11. In recent weeks the street has also been choked with visitors; the city built a platform next to the chapel, which is right around the corner from Ground Zero, so that people could view the devastated site. Today the waiting line is 12 blocks long.

Mr. Liegel sighs while staring up at the chapel, which has become a shelter offering food, medical attention or just a resting place to rescue workers. The crowd bustles around him. "Mayor Giuliani gave his farewell speech here and alluded to this being sacred ground," he says above the din. "I expect large crowds indefinitely here once the church opens. What am I going to do with them?"

Being an ex-cop has helped him communicate with the police on crowd-control matters, he adds. "The police and the National Guard have been right there, they've recognized our needs. We liaison with police officers all the time. The fact that we're retired from the force gives us an edge."

After leaving the chapel, Mr. Liegel heads off to a meeting with the property owners, then catches up on work back at his office. His days are long since Sept. 11, but another has passed without incident. Mr. Liegel can go home.

Since the attacks, Mr. Liegel has faced a singular irony: He has to keep his clients feeling safe even when he doesn't always feel so himself. "I have my fears since Sept. 11, too," he says, "Confined spaces, darkness. I don't like loud noises anymore. I definitely had visions of moving to a farmhouse in the Midwest."

But he's not going anywhere. "I had some anger toward my own government because on that day I felt unprotected. I was like, 'Where's our military? Why is this happening?' Certain agencies were caught sleeping at the wheel," he says. "But at least with this job I do have some power to change that on my level."

--Ms. Hankins is a staff reporter in The Wall Street Journal's New York bureau.